Dennis on the Streets
of Baltimore
by
Mike Smith
When I was eleven years old, I remember being
taken away by social services. I was sitting on the floor in
my room, watching Green Acres on Nick @ Nite and waiting for
my mom to call me to supper. I liked television shows that humorously
depicted country life. My favorites were The Beverly Hillbillies
and Petticoat Junction. All of a sudden, there was a knock at
the door.
"May I come in, Dennis?"
This was not my mom's voice.
"Yeah, I guess so," I said, a little
uncertain.
This little old lady came into my room and sat
on the corner of my bed.
"What are you watching, Dennis?"
"Green Acres."
"That's good."
"Yeah."
We sat there for a minute or two. I was pretending
to watch the show, but really I wanted to know what this old
bitch was up to. I didn't know why she was pretending to watch
the show. She smelled like an old woman, like my grandmother.
She was short and plump. She sported a long, blue dress with
flowers all over it. Finally, she spoke.
"We need you to come down to my office for
a little while, would that be okay?"
"I guess so," I said. "Where's
my mom?"
"Well, we need her to come down, too."
I didn't care. It got me out of the house. It
was another adventure.
I had been to plenty of offices with little old ladies over
the years
and I never understood why I was there, but I was glad I wasn't
stuck at home. This lady took me by the hand and walked me into
the kitchen. Green Acres was still on in my room. There was
a young guy in the kitchen, sitting at the table with my mom.
"Hi Dennis," this guy said.
I said nothing to this guy. He looked like he
was about 30 years old
and wore a suit. I didn't trust him much. He didn't look trustworthy.
"You ready to go?" he asked, staring
at me.
"Yeah."
He seemed anxious to leave, whereas the lady was
patient. My mom looked at me as if she wanted to tell me something.
I figured maybe this guy was forcing her to keep her mouth shut.
We weren't allowed to sit in the same car. I went with the lady,
while my mom went with the guy.
Both cars were black four-door sedans. The guy's
car had a red light in the windshield.
"See you downtown," he said to us, smiling
and waving.
The lady strapped me in the passenger seat of
her car and we left.
"What's going on?" I asked.
"Some things have come up, Dennis."
"But what things?" I asked, becoming
a bit frightened for the first
time.
"We'll discuss all of that at my office,
okay?"
She was so nice. Nice enough for me to keep my
mouth shut and trust what she was telling me. When we arrived
downtown, I asked where my mom and that guy were.
"Let's go up to my office, honey," she
said sympathetically.
We went inside this big brick building that had
about six American flags hanging on the front of it. The halls
looked like some kind of hospital, but didn't smell like one.
I smelled food, like nasty cafeteria food. It reminded me of
those disgusting rolls they made me eat in elementary school.
There wasn't anybody else around as this lady walked me to her
office.
"Here we are," she said, pointing to
a door with the name "J HAMILTON" on it.
Her office was big and clean. She had a ton of
plants sitting on the
floor and hanging from the ceiling. She told me to have a seat
and she spent about five minutes flipping through a bunch of
papers in a big red binder.
"Be patient," she said. "I have
to get everything together here."
I sat there for another ten minutes or so, just
watching her flip.
"So what's going on?" I finally asked.
"Okay, I think we're ready."
I wasn't really scared anymore, just getting bored.
"Your mom is going to have to go away for
a little while."
"Why?"
"Well, she's having some problems, but we're
going to make sure she gets some good help so she can come back
and take care of you."
I didn't really care for my mom all that much
because she was a drunk and yelled at me a lot. I always thought
she was to blame for my dad running off. I was worried about
my gun, though, which was hidden under my bed at home.
"What about my gun?"
The lady looked a little puzzled. "Gun?"
"Yeah, you know, my gun?"
"Well, we'll have someone go and get your
gun, okay?"
"Okay."
"Now since you don't really have any immediate
family, you're going to have to stay with two very nice people
in our program until we can find you a more temporary place
to live, okay, Dennis?"
"Sure."
After she filled out a lot of forms and made a
bunch of phone calls, a
young woman named Patricia came and took me out to her car.
We drove for about ten minutes and stopped at this beautiful
house that sat right in the middle of a rich neighborhood. Two
clowns rushed out to greet me.
I was sent away to live with two clowns whose
stage names were Alfie and Malphie. They were professionals.
I soon discovered that all they ever did was prepare for their
shows and try to make me "smile." I've never been
able to get certain images out of my mind. I started to see
their clown noses on their faces when they weren't wearing them.
They spoke in a high pitch "clown" voice regardless
of whether they were "in character" or not. Since
they were foster parents or whatever, I didn't expect them to
really grow on me as parents, but the whole clown aspect made
becoming any kind of family that much more difficult.
They would use their clown acts to cheer me up
when I was depressed and use slapstick comedy routines to make
me laugh when I was crying. These things only made my childhood
much, much worse. This went on for about a week until I walked
in on them having sex in their costumes one night. I had never
seen two clowns having sex before. I ran away that night and
started living on the streets of Baltimore.
....
Mike Smith is a writer, but makes more money by working at libraries
and radio stations. He once used his training in English to
teach high school Math. "Tell Christian I'm Sorry"
is his first novel. The novel contains a lot of stories. Read
his book. Look at his website (www.tellchristian.com).
To read Mike's Swallowed
Birds-a-Listenin'click here, on this sentence.
